I have to catch a plane later this morning, so it is a short time in the office. I am going to Berlin, Germany, to attend the World Money Fair.

In addition to usual show duties, I will be there with three other Krause Publications staffers to give the 2008 Coin of the Year Award. Canada is the winner of the Coin of the Year Award, which will be given for the 25th time on Feb. 2.

The winning coin is actually a four-coin set of $50 palladium pieces dated 2006 that show the Big Bear and Little Bear constellations in the Canadian night sky at four seasonal points during the year, with a nice stream and pine trees on the ground to frame them.

The International panel of judges were impressed and made the set the Coin of the Year, after having first voted the set as Most Innovative.

To someone from Wisconsin, it looks like a scene from home, so I am pleased with the judging.

There is an innovation of our own this year. We have added a People's Choice Coin of the Year Award and conducted the voting online through the NumisMaster Web site.

The result of this first effort was the victory of a 50-forint coin from Hungary that marked the 50th anniversary of the 1956 uprising against the Soviets. That heroic and tragic resistance met with tanks and brutal suppression.

However, the Hungary of today can mark that dark chapter as a point on the road to the freedom the country now enjoys.

About the Author David C. Harper has been a coin collector since 1963. He joined the Krause Publications editorial staff in 1978 and is currently editor of Numismatic News and World Coin News. He also edits two books annually, North American Coins & Prices and Coin Digest. He is the author of the Class of '63 column that runs each week in Numismatic News. His first bylined numismatic article appeared in the June 1971 issue of Coins Magazine and his various Krause Publications assignments included a stint as editor of the magazine 1980-1983. Harper received a bachelor of science degree from the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh in 1977. He had a double major of journalism and economics.